"Fourth of July, 2005 Message from Amen:  The March of Dimes:  A Sensible Plan for Peace in the World:                 Economic Neo-Leninism Merged with Individual Private Property Augmentation; and a Little Respect   for Religious Tradition"

                                by Randolph J. Amen, J.D.,  6-20-05, Revised up to and including 10-7-05 (15 pages)

A quarter pint (four ounces) of gasoline today costs about 10 cents (2.5 cents an ounce compared to drinking alcohol that will cost you at least one hundred times more in a cocktail lounge at more than $2.50 per ounce).  The four ounces of regular gasoline for 10 cents gets the average car, about one mile down the road (for a car that gets about 30 miles to the gallon).  Add in maintenance and depreciation of the vehicle, along with governmental registration and safety sticker fees as well as required private liability insurance, an American pays roughly 30 cents a mile for land transportation today (about half as much as any other citizen of any other country except Venezuela where the oil is owned by the people and hence their price is a phenomenal 12 cents per gallon!), the U.S. federal government paying its employees in compensation what it thinks is a proper compensation for the use of its employees cars, wherein the government pays for the gas and all expenses, at 50 cents per mile.  Pizza delivery drivers get about 34 cents per mile by Dominos.  Air travel by contrast, costs us about 15 cents a mile, which includes everything.  Like a bus, rather than ones private car, costs are shared by a load of other people going to the same place you are.  The costs I quote are not the cost of shipping goods, by air, train, truck or boat, which is considerably less.  The rate per mile I am giving you is for moving people from one destination to another.

Now if Joe Kennedy, who legendarily got 5 cents for every ounce of Scotch poured in America, when a Boston "Great Lakes rum runner" financier during Prohibition, who invested wisely in insider trading thereafter, skirting successfully the Depression by possibly having knowledge that others did not have, and was later rewarded for high campaign contributions to President Franklin Roosevelt by same by being put in charge of the Securities and Exchange Commission, the policing organization for the American Stock Market (Wall Street), and then was appointed by him to be Ambassador to Great Britain, just before World War II, but was recalled by FDR as possibly being a little "too Irish" and thus, "anti-British", for suggesting that Hitler could win a war against Britain and maybe should, who then devoted his energies in making one of his sons President of the United States someday, can make 5 cents an ounce on Scotch poured, why cant each individual Arab, Russian, Mexican, Indonesian and even Alaskan, Texan, Oklahoman and Californian (where the land underneath them is pumped with massive amounts of air to push out oil, hence increasing the chances of earthquakes), make 5 cents a quarter pint for gas poured (or a penny per ounce)?

If each individual Arab shared that largesse, I would say it would go a long way to (1) cause them to have an investment in private property and modern capitalism; (2) draw them away from and let them outgrow their dependence on outdated Islamic loyalty "yes-ism"; (3) allow them power to reform their autocratic governments, making them more democratic; (4) help them stop their hatred of "Crusaders" since those "Crusaders" will have helped them rise from poverty and encourage them to get justice in their own countries; (5) bring them into the modern world of globalization since the rich oil would not be horded by foreigners and their monarchs, and instead they could be part of the profit of selling it to China, America, Japan, Europe and other very needful oil places, which would be paying them, those individual Arabs, as if they were the Beverly Hillbillies themselves, for the riches of the blessing beneath their feet.

Of course, ExxonMobil wont agree to "share" their assets or profits with the common man and woman and child of Arabia.  Yet Pepsi did in the USSR and Coke did in Poland.  Microsoft as well as Japanese and American car manufacturers do in China.  And, most of the world today, has done it with Hollywood movies and television.  No matter that it was one of Karl Marxs, Frederick Engles, Vladimir Lenins, Leon Trotskys or even Mao Dejungs ideas like unemployment insurance, Social Security, free medical care, guaranteed employment, tht the idea of "Joint Ventures", since it has been adopted by most Third World Nations, whether communist or not, is a way to keep foreign investment from controlling their countries and it has worked fairly well in Mexico and Argentina, the two most prosperous Latin American countries. 

The problem, of course, are the "sweetheart deals" between the investors, developers, sometimes the developers unions, and the government oligarchies of the native country, which effectively cut out the general population from a "piece of the pie".  When militaries are used to enforce these deals, which are considered legitimate contracts, recognized by the World Bank and the United Nations, as well as American courts, as being lawful and appropriate, and not as Castro said, a "looting of the public treasury", only the poor suffer, the effects.  Although Castros Cuba has the lowest infant morality rate, the highest education rate, and good public facilities, compared to all other Latin American countries, it developed its "communist utopia" by large subsidies from the USSR, while it sent the Warsaw Pact its fruits, sugar and cigars.  Without capitalism, it never made a "profit" with its goods, not even with its mercenary armies in Africa or its aid to revolutionary movements in Central, South America and the Caribbean, despite the fact that the "Yankees" were no longer "expropriating" its wealth.  Castro kicking out Anaconda Minerals, United Fruit and the Mafia, as well as Uncle Sam as a patron of Americans interests there, did cause the people to have a better standard of living in the long run, but unlike in the semi-socialist Social Security conscious America or the "democratic socialist" or "Christian Socialist" Europe (devoid of leadership by a Communist Party or a Socialist Party directed from Moscow), the Americans, the Europeans, and now the Asians, have done it with capitalism as a partner in this semi-socialist world.  Even Latin America and Africa may attain such a state of affairs.  Why not the Middle East?

In some countries, like Costa Rica and Kuwait, benign leadership has resulted in the peoples standard of living rising dramatically, not due to capitalism or socialism.  Such benign governmental leadership, supported by the United States, has allowed the fortunate citizens in those countries to take advantage of their inherent wealth.  And, as the American experiment has shown, when the people get advantage of the wealth under their feet, they (1) tend to work harder, (2) are more loyal to their government, and (3) are much less likely to harbor and protect revolutionaries like Osama bin Laden.  The exception, of course, are places like Hawaii and Kuwait, where the riches derive without hard work, since others simply pay a high price to be there (tourists in Hawaii) or have it (oil in Kuwait) and the "natives" dont have to do much work, to generate the moolah.

I propose a United Nations resolution and an American policy and law that recognizes the inherent worth of natural resources, whether they be (1) minerals, (2) agricultural products, (3) manufactured goods, (4) technological devices and services, (5) highly productive and/or creative people or, (6) oil.  The law or policy should also recognize the inherent realization that the people, such as in Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Iran, are allowed to share in their "property right" to the land they live on, not necessarily by "nationalization", the bug-a-boo that started the Cold War, but by my proposal of "profit sharing" which does not allow local government to exclude the people since their monthly, weekly or even daily "dividends" would come from an international organization like the World Bank, not from their own governments and it would be in currency that could be used to buy only foreign products and services administered from without the country, not regulated within, so that their own governments could not cheat them, at every turn, with their own money, earmarked for them.  And, if the World Bank, the G-8 countries, the United Nations or any other international group opposed the plan, I would then provide those nationals in their countries with coupons only available for use to buy American goods and services, and let the rest of the world rot (until they realized that they should get in on a "good thing" and use "Euro-dollars or some sort of international outside of native land coupons" instead).

Of course no tyrannical country would want their own people empowered this way by "foreigners" and would oppose the idea (even we Americans might not "opt-in" since we are so selfish and paranoid about the United Nations or "foreigners" and so sufficiently secure right now, that we wouldnt trust that someone other than Uncle Sam himself, looking out for us).  But, as the two systems were compared with each other, an East Germany-West Germany, North Korea-South Korea scenario would develop, allowing people in the world to see and hear, through Voice of America broadcasts as well as simple internet worldwide communication, that those who were "capitalists", that is, those who let their money make them money, were better off than those forced to live without disposable income.  It would encourage everyone in the world to be a "Leninist Capitalist", although as the standards of living of everyone became progressively equal, those exploited at the bottom would lessen and lessen, and hence, "capitalism" could no longer operate with its "less fair" attributes, but world wide competition would increase and thus "free enterprise", would.  As trade multiplied (between countries as it did between the states when the US Supreme Court ruled that no state could tax another states residents), income tax revenues would skyrocket and hence a constitutional amendment should be passed in our country and others to reduce tax rates in proportion to economic largesse unless otherwise irrelatedly indicated, unlike what we have today, which is a government growing in bad times and good, since it simply is an uncontrollable growth, hurting innocent Americans with an increasingly unnecessary and more burdensome growth, since it has nothing better to do but to grow as a self-sustaining cancer on the self-determination liberty of the people..

But, I take the term, "Leninist-Capitalist" back.  Both words are so hated, still, by one side or the other for one word or the other, in the ignorant world today, that although technically accurate, probably should be called, "Shared Wealth for All" or "Peace, Justice and the Worldwide Way" or "You get more money with this Plan, Kids".  I also rather like the American folklore Presidential campaign sayings, "New Deal", "Fair Deal" or "Square Deal", since they are so simple, and "A chicken in every pot" or "a car in every garage" or more modernly, "two cars in a two car garage" or "a computer in every classroom" or "a computer in everyones room" or "wireless laptops and palm pilots and cellphones with no additional charge for long distance (or even international calls), all hooked up for immediate use and no per-call usage cost, for $9.99 per month!" and "You too can be like Tom Cruise and his new lady wife, Batmans girlfriend, if you buy, no money down, our new American plan, to make us all rich in a jiffy; now which color did you want that sports car to be?", or something like that, which everyone in the world could understand and not automatically hate, since they otherwise heard a "buzz word" or two.

Of course, the Middle East today, is the powder keg, because Middle Easterners in the last 700 years, came from an Islamic empire, greater than Caesars, to end up a loser, time and time again, due to (1) the Crusades, when Christianity, mainly because of its prejudice against Jews and Moslems, but later because of its colonialism, became geo-economically and geo-militarily predominant; (2) prejudicial discrimination of the super-power of its time, Spain, and an intolerant Vatican, disbursing the Moors, the Turks, and other Moslems, out of Southwestern and Central Europe (along with similar anti-Semiticism against the Jews); (3) after England and France eclipsed Spain, Italy and Portugal and thus Protestant Christians, rather than Catholic Christians became predominant in the world, World War I, predominantly between secular Germany and France, when Turkey (the leading Islamic country at the time) found itself on the side of Germany, the loser, instead of Britain and France, the winners; thus the Middle East was then carved up by the winners, Britain taking Palestine, Jordon, Iraq and Iran; France getting Lebanon and Syria; and America allowed to roost in the latter day post-war lands of Saudi Arabia and Kuwait and, after World War II, even Iran and Israel.  As the West divided up their "spoils of war", it became apparent that this desert land had something much more valuable than camels, Arabian horses, figs, sesame seeds, and land routes to China, when an American geologist looking for water for King Saud so that his united desert peninsula which he had finally stolen from all other warlords, stumbled on a new discovery, like the Beverly Hillbillies did, "black gold".  Although Woodrow Wilson had tried to stop the thievery of Britain and France to re-colonize the world after World War I (with his call for "self-determination of people" and the League of Nations), America too decided to enter the fray, at least in the economic sphere in 1928 and again in 1932 by deciding that King Saud was going to be an exporter to America for a long time, indeed, since "his" oil apparently was the largest find in the world.  All America had to do in return was "always protect the royal family from anyone and let the royal family do whatever it wanted inside the holy land, the land of Mecca and Medina (where Prophet Muhammad was born and lived) and where the Moslems all over the world came, to pay their once in a lifetime homage to the big, black stone, circling it endlessly, with prayers of thanksgiving and brotherhood for all mankind.  Although religiously tolerant America saw no harm in that, Saudi Arabias anti-American Islam, known as "Wahabiism" laid the seeds for Islamic revolution, ultimately Iranian style, and then Al-Qaeda style.  And after World War II, when Truman solidly backed Gold Meirs Israel, after the British pulled out, tired of trying to keep the Israeli nationalists and the Palestinians with their Arab allies from decimating each other, and the United Nations partitioned India and Pakistan, Palestine and Israel, and China fell to Mao, the Arabs felt cheated by "white skinned" people again, by those almost entirely European folks, since the huge exodus of Jews was from Europe, from the Holocaust and even Stalins pogroms, not Middle Eastern Jews (who by in large were already there in small numbers).  To America and the Jews, it was returning to the "Promised Land".  But to Moslems, it was another Crusade like the ones in the 1100s or the colonization after World War II, always done by "white skinned" Europeans, always claiming Christianity or Judaism was somehow better than Islam.  And, now, the Christians and Jews had forged an alliance and had ganged up on the Bedouin nomads, who simply wanted to be left in peace to sell their camels, as well as their wives and daughters, to the highest bidder.

Although the new State of Israel would speak Hebrew, a derivative of Aramaic, the ancient tongue of modern day Arabic, still, they were Europeans, true and blue, coming by the droves in their new "Exodus" with American money coming flowing in too, to boot, speaking mother-tongue European languages, having had a European education, having European cultural attitudes, and eating that crazy European cuisine!  One European Jew on the block, there goes the neighborhood, and real estate prices!  Muhammad was turning over in his grave! 

You see, the Moslems had a special grievance with the Jews.[1]  It seems back in around 1800BC, Abraham, who was from Ur, a Mesopotamian town (they worshipped idols like Baal and Moloch), had no children by his beloved wife Sarah.  Wanting so much for a son to have an inheritance and carry on his rich bounty, it was terrible, in those days, for such a rich man to have no son to bequeath to, ones riches, indeed.  So, by and by, Sarah, his beloved, said, "Abram, you may have my servant girl, Hirai, who will give you a son."  Although Abram was a little old by then, the lovely teenage lass seemed to "invigorate his loins".  About nine months later, she bore him Ishmael. 

But then a funny thing happened on the way to the Temple of Baal to dedicate the child just before he was to reach puberty (a kind of bar mitzvah for the Babylonians).  God spoke to Abram and said, "Even though you are 99, and Sarah, 91, you will have a child by her and you will be the father of the Jewish nation, he, the son, and this new nation will believe in the one God, Me, and henceforth your name will change to Abraham," the story of which the Koran says is totally true except that it says, God said his own name was "Allah" and Abrahams name was, "Abrahim"[2].

When Abram told his wife this funny story, she started laughing since she knew that his and her days of rollicking in the hay had all been gone for some time, since they had both become kind of rickety and asexual by then.  She said, "Abram, if you and I have a child together, I will call him Isaac (meaning laughing) since it will be the funniest thing to happen since my grandfather caught his beard on his ornery goats horn."

Not to be outdone by Abrams and Sarahs lack of faith, by and by, God decided to have a little fun with them both.  He caused them to have a wild time one night on their anniversary when imbibing a little too much wine, eating a little too much herb root which "wise men" from the East called "opium", or smoking a little too much hemp, when they then came down from  their "high" from the jokes they told each other, remembering their long life of love for each other which included the many times they enjoyed each other both physically and spiritually, as well as their wonderful "rabbi, Baal and priest walked into a bar" jokes  they told one another.  Proceeding, at that point, to make google eyes at each other, they had sex, and nine months later, out popped Isaac, laughing at them both.  They marveled at the wonderment of God, and Isaac became the inheritor of his dads wealth. 

There was one little problem though.  What about Ishmael, the son of the servant girl, Hirai?  Hirai had thought she had attained some status by being a surrogate mother for Abram and Sarah, and her son, Ishmael, her pride and joy, had the markings of a true desert nomad with a Jewish sense of humor. 

Of course, since she was but a servant girl from some tribe, lesser in importance than the great Abram clan of what was then known as "Hibri" (later to become "Hebrews"), she had to leave, along with her son.  Although Abram and Sarah appreciated their good service, they were not needed now, and told them "The Lord had spoken and opened up Sarahs womb and hence, good-bye, and good riddance" or as Rosanna Danna Danna says on Saturday Night Live, "Never mind".

Hirai and Ishmael left in disgrace, with little more than the shirts on their backs, while that "superior" tribe of Mesopotamians (people originating near or around the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers which was found  settled in Ur of the Chaldeans since the Chaldeans were less prejudicial and a little more open-minded than in Nineveh, the Babylonians, a little further to the North) celebrated their God, the one and only true God, instead of worshipping Baal or Moloch, Beelzebub, or even the great ruler in Babylon, who everyone knew had gods of bronze and feet of clay, but nevertheless, they could see and touch all of those "gods".  Abrams and Sarahs and now Isaacs "god" appeared rather invisible and rather selfish, prejudiced, and apparently narcissistically self-possessed, making Abram, Sarah and Isaac happy, but making "inferiors" like Hirai and Ishmael, miserable.  And, the reason, it appeared, was because they were not "Hibri" (a desert nomad tribe that had an unusually good sense of humor) which Abram had led in cosmopolitan Ur (Hirai probably was just "a poor, country girl").

Now as the story continues, we see Abraham being told by God to kill (thus sacrifice) his only begotten "Hibri" son, Isaac (since both Abram and Sarah were Hibri but Hirai was not and thus Ishmael was a half-breed, not pure enough to have the name, "Hibri", to show his devotion to that one and only one true God).  Although Abram was willing to commit infanticide for God, God stopped it before it was completed and substituted a ram instead for Abrams sacrifice.  In those days, it was common to give an animal, often an unblemished one, like a fully white lamb (which another Hibri had figured out, through genetic experiment as to how to breed) or an animal of great value, to a "god" who was in charge of the kind of thing you wanted in prayer, to slaughter it in a ceremonial ritual to show ones devotion to the god, cook it, and then for the priests to feast on it, as they gave "ash" offerings to the populace and vice versa, and some bones and scraps to the crowd, and the populace gave homage to the priests of these gods, keeping them in their exalted places as the peoples "men of conscience", a kind of rudimentary judiciary before Moses established the first great judicial branch of government with Judah or at least a descendent of that man or tribe of "Hebrews", at its head (hence the name, "judiciary"), about 400 or 500 years later, for a new country he had founded, called,  "Israel".  Some of these "gods", like Moloch, maintained temple prostitutes for those who tithed generously and even wanted "human child sacrifices" to show devotion from their subjects, and so when the one and only true God asked for the pure, unblemished to-be progenitor of the Jewish people to be sacrificed by Abram, it seemed only right to oblige.  Neither the Bible nor the Koran tells us what Sarah thought about it, women having little say in things like law, politics, philosophy, religion, tradition or raising children, in those days.  Children were simply the "property" of the father, so he could do what he wanted with them, all perfectly legal.  Of course, a brother could not kill a brother, since the tradition had it that it was bad for Cain to kill Abel, but for a father or ruler to kill, that is, someone of sufficient authority to pass lethal judgment on an "inferior", since a "father" was equivalent to a "god", it was fine, in those days, for him to kill a child or put away a woman in divorce (if she gave him any lip).

Now, back in the desert where Hirai and Ishmael were suffering for being kicked out of the Abraham family, the young teenage Ishmael was very jealous of his younger half-brother, Isaac, indeed, and swore one day something he heard God tell him in a dream which was that if Abraham who begot Isaac who was to beget so many Jews, like "the sands of the sea", they would have a nation of their own someday, than he too would be a "father of a great people" and thus possible avenge, someday, what the Jews had done to his mother and him (by casting them out as "inferiors").

The Moslems have adopted Ishmael as that blood-line ancestor and so must vindicate the mistreatment of Hirai and Ishmael.  For "Jews" to come back to Palestine, after Canaanites (pre-Moslem Middle Easterners) and Moslems lived and ruled there since 70AD when the Romans obliterated Jerusalem, and thus for 1900 years, after having kept the Christians out and after having had to fight Christians for 800 years to keep them out, and for the Jews to call it their "homeland", once again, after all that, ignoring the fact that Palestinians (the ancient Philistines) had made it there home for at least 3500 years, particularly in the areas of Gaza and Jericho (which was much older than even Jerusalem) and the West Bank (Trans-Jordan or Jordan), was a particularly egregious insult.  The ancient Ammonites and Moabites also living in that area, were half Jews, like Ishmael, and the Jews returning, claiming "all the land from the Tigris-Euphrates to Sinai" as the Old Testament claims God gave them, is, once again, slapping Hirai and Ishmael in the face, ignoring that they were and still are human beings and even land owners today, and deserve to stay in their homes, despite European audacity to go anywhere they please and take anything they want.  "Thou Shalt not Steal" was true under Hammurabi, under Moses, under Jesus and under Mohammed, but apparently Europeans and Jews skipped that commandment from the Ten, when in their oh so busy lives of mass accumulation of wealth, including wealth that was not theirs for the taking, they nevertheless, took what they wanted, despite people already living there and the Jews not having been there in any significant numbers for 1900 years.  It would be like the Massapequa Indians (the Indian name which still bears its name in a city on Long Island), saying, "Listen, you can have your beads back; we are coming in and taking Manhattan back, since it was our land originally about 450 years ago." Or it is similar to the Hawaiian nationalist movement of today that, although they make up less than 5% of the people, would like the islands back now since Uncle Sam took them illegally in 1898, even though, in 1959 more than 70% of the residents then there voted to become a state of the United States and I believe the number has come up since then.  Like Puerto Ricans, Virgin islanders, American Samoans and those from Guam, even natives there prefer to be part of the United States.  It was not true for the Filipinos, Marshallese, Cubans, Japanese, Germans, Italians or French when we had control of their countries, so America granted them independence or simply "liberated" them or in the case of the Japanese and Germans, stayed until a strong democratic pro-American constitution and government had been established (like probably in Afghanistan and Iraq today) and then, to leave.  As you may recall, the National Liberation Front with their Viet Cong army, allied with North Vietnam, kicked us out, and then unified with North Vietnam to make the Republic of Vietnam, the dream of Ho Chi Minh since the end of World War II when he thought that Vietnam was finally free of both the Japanese and French, kicking out the Japanese in 1945 and the French in 1954.  It took his country to 1975 to kick out the Americans..

But Americans do not know that Middle Eastern history of the Bible since Christians are probably the least learned "People of the Book", concentrating too much on the New Testament, since, after all, their faith is based on the New Testament, not the Old, although they say, everything in the Old points to the New.  And, the Jews, who do know this history all too well, seem to sluff it off, as nothing important, because God made them, the "chosen people", not Ishmael and his descendants.  Or did He?  Ishmael was to have no inheritance, and, what, be ignored in history, forever a "half-breed inferior", erased as the "son of Abraham" as Moses was erased as the "son of Pharaoh?  Moses too was cast off into the desert without enough to get him to an oasis, but he made it too, as it appeared to be Gods will, and part-Egyptian, but mostly Palestinian people took him in, adopted his religion of Judaism, and helped him, eventually, to return to Egypt to be the first great "savior", leading the Jews out of bondage.  The truth that he (1) was Jewish, as the son of a Jew, yet (2) the step-son of Pharaoh (probably Amenhotep IV or Ramses II, who had probably legally adopted him by then or believed he had been born by a princess of the court), (3) raised into adulthood by the Egyptian royal court with the greatest education in the world, (4) was a murderer in the sense of killing an Egyptian, (5) was banished from Egypt, (6) then, was nurtured by a kindly Philistine or other nomadic peoples who were not Jewish, (7) married into them, (8) had a half Jew son, Aaron, by his non-Jewish wife, etc.; doesnt seem to resonate well with the Jews, since to have accepted Aaron would have meant that Abraham should have accepted Ishmael.  To send an innocent boy out into the desert, abandoning ones fatherly obligation, as no decent father ever does when that father is a "Person of the Book" (a believer in the Old Testament, the New Testament or the Koran), is not to be a father at all, and certainly does not deserve the title, "father of a nation".  Yet, the Koran gives proper due to Abraham, as the father of one of the "People of the Book", father, that is, of the Old Testament book. 

So, what about Ben-Ammi, the Moabite, who was the only honest man in Sodom and Gomorrah who pleaded with God to save the twin cities, and whose wife was turned into a pillar of salt and whose daughters had sex with him?  What about the Ammonites, another half-Jew breed, like I am (my father is of Russian Hebrew heritage and my mother of Polish Catholic)?  Why, they figure into Biblical stories, right and left, as if they were important.  Why not Ishmael?  Why did he inherit everything and then lose it all with the blessed birth of Isaac?  Why such discrimination, reversal of fortune and cruel abandonment?  Was it his fault that God let Abram and Sarah have their own child together after all?

Well, as far as I can see, the Jews do not have an answer.  Christians keep trying to invent one such as that the Babylonians were bad or that the Philistines were bad and thus, somehow, Ishmael, who was neither, was bad.  Or, well, we all know the present day Palestinians or Moslems are bad, thus Ishmael, their patron saint, must have been bad.  It is like President Bush renaming French Fries, "Freedom Fries", because, after all, the French are bad (for not joining us in war against Saddam).

Such idiocy by Christians and Jews (and modern day Americans) only make me consider seriously the fact that I never heard any hatred in mosques against anyone, not even the Buddhists, who the Taliban decided to blow up their great statue of, in Afghanistan, since Buddha wasnt Moslem.  On the other hand, I am shocked and surprised at the constant hate-mongering I hear in Christian and Jewish gatherings against the Moslems, particularly since 9/11, because, I guess, they are the new scapegoat, the new "inferiors", to be hauled away in cattle cars to Gitmo or Abu Ghraib with no rights at all, and tortured, because they gave money to an Islamic charity, which may or may not support the ideology of Osama.

Well, my plan to co-opt these Ishmaelites into the world oil oligarchy, and thus undermine the royalty, autocrats and dictators of the Middle East, may not sound so good to those that have capitalized on the exploitation such as capitalists or royalty like Queen Elizabeth and her counselors at Westminster Abbey, yet, governance such as "royalty" must be earned, as Shakespeare and Jefferson both otherwise proclaimed in their great literary works.  When King George III couldnt beat the Americans in either the Revolutionary War or the War of 1812[3], we still respected his successor, Queen Victoria, for about a century later until she died, as the standard for all things civilized and proper, since we could not deny that the Brits had a kind of sauvee faire when it came to "manners" and "good taste".  Napoleon had sold us the Louisiana Territory, the Brits then defeated him at Waterloo (after he had conquered much of Europe including Spain and Italy, and almost Russia), and like Napoleon, the Brits finally released their claims to the Oregon Territory, just South of British Nova Scotia (New Scotland) or Newfoundland (I get the two mixed up), thus allowing America to draw the maps of the world to include a parallel across Canada from the Great Lakes that went all the way to the Pacific Ocean.  Without the British finally giving up that territory, with Americans to buy, take it, steal it, or whatever, in order to settle it with American pioneers, the Americans may have gone into Western Canada, as they did Northern Mexico (what is now the Western part of the United States), all the way up to Alaska.[4] and from there, through Russia or the Asian coast southward.

Since America is more than the Roman Empire or the British Empire at its height, there was now a Pax Americana (as an aftermath of winning the Cold War and the Gulf War under Reagan and Bush, leaving their successor, Clinton, to administer the New World Order of peace) like the Romans had a Pax Romana (as an aftermath of conquering the Mediterranean and most of Europe under Julius Caesar and generally stopped conquering thereafter under his successors), yet when a small private army like Osamas can kill more Americans than the Japanese imperial army did at Pearl Harbor (about 3000 in New York and DC in 2001, compared to about 2000 killed at Pearl Harbor 60 years earlier), then it does not appear that America is safe.  With biological, chemical (such as anthrax or infectious disease toxins) and/or nuclear weapons in the hands of enemies, America needs friends, not disagreeing allies that opposed our actions in Iraq, like France, Germany and Russia.  If a leader in America were to propose my plan for third world country citizens and natives to get direct money from the resources they have or produce, instead of allowing capitalists and developers to always have the fruit of American or ally conquest, I would say, we could regain and sustain the respect for our great society, that is now educating the world. 

Business class people are glad to do business with America since there is often money in it for them.  Political leaders will likewise, if it ensures their power.  In a world where military action is what the administration believes is the solution, we become "the new Hitlers" to those caught underneath the bombs (whether they come from us in jet planes or attack helicopters, or from the ground by them, resisting us, by strapping bombs on a live body, in a car or truck, or hidden near or on a road by local insurgents) and thus the innocent victims of the carnage will likely hate us since we bring mass destruction in our wake (even though so-called "weapons of mass destruction" are not used).  Napalm and carpet bombing, designed to kill civilians in Vietnam, made some military sense because jungle foliage hid the innocent and not so innocent so well from air attack and since so many of those "gooks" were not on our side, no?  The peasants wanted Uncle Ho[5], not Uncle Sam, to be their patron saint. 

Thus our "adversaries", those people, the people, who would otherwise blow themselves up[6] just to have a lucky punch at Uncle Sam, should be offered a hand up, and protection, not a hand out to their oppressors, or torture or indefinite confinement for them or their friends, so that Uncle Sam can be a kindly uncle indeed, not a flying monkey with bombs coming down galore.  America should be a hope, for mankind, so the "bad guys" lose their support from locals.[7]

Since capitalism won the Cold War and even the USSR and China are on our side now, we have the opportunity of a lifetime to show the world the heart and soul of America.  Although the Romans had crucifixion as capital punishment, it also had a system of justice, where the innocent were not to be hurt and where everyone was given a trial (although rather perfunctorily), and even had "appeal" rights "to Caesar" if they had become a Roman citizen, which was not hard to do.  Why cant America be like the ancient Greeks and Romans and the British Empire after them, associated as great liberators, democratists, deliverers, teachers and uplifters, for everyone, letting everyone become an American citizen if they pledge their loyalty, as opposed to us being bullies or thugs, excluding the current "enemy" whether it was local communists or neutralists in Vietnam or Baathists and al-Qaeda operatives now (who if brought out in the open to speak and to vote are a lot less likely to hide "in their holes" and caves, plotting more revenge).  Americans know so little about Islam, know nothing about its history and the tradition and temperament of the people, yet we will destroy the flea on our head with a hammer.  Why does America have to invade and destroy to find "weapons of mass destruction" when those weapons were in Libya, Iran and North Korea instead?  Why have allies like Pakistan which admits it sold nuclear secrets to Iran and North Korea?  I know the answer is often, "strategic necessity", which sometimes makes strange bedfellows of us and others, like our support for Stalin once Hitler showed his true colors and looked like he could defeat the USSR, then linking up with the Japanese so the Axis could take the much needed Arabian oil fields, which although not much developed by World War II, looked like they would be the mainstay of all power in the world by the last half of the 20^th century.

I think it inevitable that everyone and every country will someday have the bomb.  I think it foolhardy to take a mid-century technology and expect nations to not secretly try to develop it so that they can defend through "deterrence" (as we did) themselves, if need be.  Our Second Amendment (right to bear arms) applies to us, but not others?  If such "weapons of mass destruction" fall into the wrong hands, it is like Hitler having the V-2 or jet planes or the Soviets having 50 mega ton hydrogen bombs.  But if "an enemy" never used them against us since we did not threaten them, as we assume India, Pakistan, Israel, France, Britain, China and Russia will not use their nuclear or bio-chemical arsenals (or whatever weapons of mass destruction they harbor for their own protection) against us, then what does it matter?  The USSR has had nuclear weapons for 56 years yet we are still the only country to have used them in anger.

In order to stop the current nonsense in the world today, which can only get worse with the Bush Doctrine of thinking we must force our enemies to disarm and somehow stop smugglers from bringing dangerous weapons into America, and hence we must pre-empt a war by making war, I think the policy stinks and can never work. 

If a nation didnt have responsible leaders who were moving to bring liberty to their people, yet might be dangerous since they might do something that would ultimately harm America (as has always been the case throughout our history), I wouldnt send in the Marines.  I would send in the Peace Corps, helping the people in that country to improve their lot and ignore the government if it objected.  Id land them on the beaches, from the land, sea and air, armed with chocolate and nylons, not guns.  And if North Korea, Iran or any other country mowed our unarmed corps down, or used some other act of force or coercion to stop us doing this great humanitarian and peaceful work, then I would send in the Marines.

Did you know that our current war making efforts will cost us about $300 billion dollars?  If we make war in North Korea, Syria, Iran, it could easily be a trillion in a nation that only takes in about $7 trillion a year to pay for the service of the entire federal government.  Halliburton, ExxonMobil, General Dynamics and Boeing doesnt have to pay for any wars; in fact, they will war profit from any that start.  You and I (and our children and grandchildren) pay for it in our income taxes to Uncle Sam.  Did you know there are only about 6.4 billion people in the whole world?  If we didnt spend that money on war, and that money was distributed to every single man, woman and child on Earth, everyone would get a hundred dollar bill, a crisp Ben Franklin, befitting of a great nation, sharing its wealth in the name of a patriot so wise, witty, fair minded, anti-slavery, democratic, and great, that he (except for Alexander Hamilton) is the only non-President on our currency.  When we spend $100 to uplift everyone, all boats will rise, the economies of all countries will prosper, and I do believe everyone (except munitions manufacturers and some right-wing ideologues) would prefer that largesse being provided to them individually, rather than another present from Uncle Sam "on high" in the form of a $100 bomb on their head!  And, a fortiari, if it is a "smart bomb" or one launched from a Predator or Stealth craft, it costs about $20,000 each, at least.  

When the Peace Corps goes into each country of the world, they should march in with rolls of dimes to distribute to the fathers and mothers and chewing gum for their kids (even a dime goes a long way in a Third World nation) to demonstrate Americas down payment for their help in rooting out mendacious insurgency in their country and will represent Americas peaceful leadership (which would go down in history as Pax Americana)in a world, wherein each ounce of oil pumped would result in a dime for the Third World people (five tank fulls representing $100) .  If we did have the courage of a JFK to tell the oil oligarchs that they must share their profits with those on desert lands above the oil, we would be the first Age of Aquarius-John Lennon "conquerors", having learned from 20^th century visionaries like Gandhi or Martin Luther King, Jr., who won their "wars" without violence.  Osama, Saddam, Il Sung Kim and other master killers could be sent to school to learn how to win with persistent, democratic self-sacrificial, leadership, and not by sacrificing the young and impressionable of their flock to certain death to "get 21 virgins in Heaven".

I dont know anyone in the world, not even Osama, who wants to kill Santa Claus.  It would be like killing Mother Teresa or Pope John Paul[8] or Marco Polo, coming unarmed with hands outstretched in peace.  And, if anyone did, I think Russia, France, Germany, and China (as France and Germany did to help NATO defeat Milosevic in Bosnia and Kosovo), would then be on our side and would send in their marines to fight by our side, by our marines, along with everyone else in the world who would probably do likewise).  I dont think any dictator would last long when the whole world, including their own people, united against despotism, and did to him, as the Italians themselves did to Mussolini.[9]  And, when those young, frustrated idealists finally did, after all else failed and their leaders would not relent, it would save us a whole lot of money since they would be doing to their leaders what the French revolutionists[10] or Russian revolutionists did to theirs[11], which those heartless autocrats deserved, instead us being the only murderers, with blood on our hands.

I think the "war on terror" is stupid.  It is like declaring war on murder or bad smells.  The "war on poverty" made some sense to me but the "war on drugs" seemed suspect.  Did we win any of these "wars" yet?  Will we ever?  But since LBJ, Bush the First, and now Bush the Second (all Texans) started "wars on concepts", Ill tell you what war I would support.  I would declare an international war on munitions manufacturers or the concept of munitions.  If we could agree that more dangerous that murderers, terrorists, drugs and poverty are mines, bombs, explosive weapons, and poisons, that is, those things that make the body explode, implode and bleed, I would say we have mastered a concept worth declaring war against.  Defensive weapons, like non-fatal stun guns or Star Wars, would be OK in accordance with the Second Amendment idea that it is OK to defend oneself, family and/or property.  I would just take lethality out of the mix. 

I am not so nave as to think that "disarmament" will ever work.  But if the Catholics can burn witches, the Nazis books, and the Americans insurgents, jihadists and terrorists, why not lets destroy and burn to the ground anything and everything that can maim and/or kill human life, particularly if made for that purpose.  The argument that they are made for deterrent and self-defense makes sense, but would not non-fatal or non-blood letting self-defense "weapons" or "shields" be preferable?  While the Germans in the 1930s and early 1940s made offensive weapons galore, the British and Americans made radar, sonar and computers that broke secret code.  While both the USA and the USSR at the end of that war and during the Cold War made atomic weapons and missiles, some made nuclear reactors for production of electricity and to power huge ships that were cities on the oceans and spacecraft that could not use solar energy since they were sent past our solar system.

When morality returns to America, as we had it once, Americans will know that the world can admire a giant who doesnt abuse his strength.  When that giant is kindly like King Kong or the Jolly Green Giant, Uncle Sam may still be very big indeed, but not a fire breathing dragon or Godzilla, come to transform mankind into our image. 

If the rest of the world loved America or our ideals, as they often do our inventions and entertainment, we would not be fighting anyone since bad things would be self-correcting by those that could see that good is better than bad.  But, if we do not take a leadership stand for the good, since we have become a nation that thinks good is that which we want, like cheap gasoline or lower taxes or hoisting the American flag on the Fourth of July in blind admiration, never thinking what the flag really means, particularly to others who regard us as "The Great Satan" who drops more bombs than any nation in history, then we disgrace our country as Hitler did to his, by doing wrong with the great minds and spirit of the German or American people.

Great ideals such as Karl Marxs safety nets for all, even the weak or lazy, or Ayn Rands call for excellence rewarded in achievement for individuals as rugged individualists do not necessarily create a competition or tension between altruists, communalists and egoists.  Nor must there be conflict between secularists and religionists or between different religions.  With a deism wise enough to realize that all things good are good and all things bad are bad, there can often be balance in the world.  Today I see a world arguing over whether we should propel forward or turn the front wheel of the bicycle when both are obviously the answer.  Ideologues would send us astray from both right and left since they cannot see that we can take the best from the liberal view and the conservative view and meld them together like alloys that are stronger than metals found in nature.  By diluting our strength with petty squabbles as to who knows whats best when both sides, in their pure states, are wrong, but together they make sense in the modern world, moving the ship through a sometimes turbulent ocean when moving the rudder to the right or moving the rudder to the left is sensible, we can adhere back to American ideals of tolerance of all, while we continue the journey of finding whats best for all and in the long run, avoiding bad in that eternal sense.

Tolerance and exploration results in an informed mind.  Open-mindedness is the fundamental that starts it all.  Those who have closed minds like the fundamentalists in Al-Qaeda, Iran, North Korea or Christian or reactionary extremists in America who do not see the dynamic within religious and philosophical tradition, but only its absolutes, often bring new absolutes, in things God never said, in any of the great books of wisdom throughout the world.  Osama and President Bush need a refresher course in Koranic and Biblical teaching since both wisdoms say the same thing about what they are doing.  Id put them in a room with a banana so that they can beat each other with it until they learn they can share a nice meal together instead.  Or, if they are more than monkeys, let them debate like Gore and Bush did.  But, if both are simply going to be monkey machines as in the classic modern Presidential debates, simply repeating the party line, rather than addressing their differences or the important points each side makes with honest responses, I think there should be a moderator panel consisting of Pat Buchanan, Ross Perot and Jesse Ventura on our side and whoever Osama wants on his, that will point out each time either debater refused to answer a question, in order to humiliate the evader so the public would know that either or both are avoiding the issues.  The populace doesnt realize who is faltering unless they are forced to see it since their biases cause them to feel very insecure if their side is not winning.  Hence they get angry at anyone who challenges their icon.  If the panel is doing it, rather than the opponent, however, the public can then see that what is happening is fair to both sides.  When fairness becomes more important than the ideological leaning, the public may finally get ready for the gift of democracy.  I would also precede and secede the show with a class in why juries and democracy can work, but not if they are just used and thus abused to confirm the biased or prejudiced view, already established.  If people could be asked to suspend their beliefs until all the evidence had been presented, as the judge explains to a jury they must do, then we can be immediately edified by the debate and justice can ultimately be done by the verdict rendered.  If those who have already formed their opinions and will not change them are part of the electorate or jury or critics, who refuse to listen to the evidence before rendering their decision, I would kick them out with humiliation to show the world an example of a person who thinks he/she know it all and thus can never be fair (doing it to "holier than thou" people on both sides would drive home the point).  

There is no reason why tyrants cant learn to get along, if Americans would not shirk their duty on the Fourth of July.  The Fourth of July should not be celebrated as a lock step march toward patriotism without a mind.  It should be celebrated as the date when Americans banded together to form a declaration that was suitable for the whole world, since it talked about concepts that transcended nationhood.  I think we should be proud of what our Founding Fathers accomplished in raising the consciences of mankind.  And, since then, there have been even more amazing advances in human progress, all due to the idea that the Creator, not government, gives us an inalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness and no government may govern without the consent of the governed.  If it governs without that consent, it does so with raw power, not "just power".

These concepts are worth a great day of remembrance for a great nation and great people who have led the world since then.  If we deny the world their fair share of those inalienable rights and just horde them for ourselves, at their expense, then we defeat the international role of us being leaders and should defer to the United Nations for policing the world.  Only with moral leadership that everyone can admire, can we win back the hearts and minds of a world gone off course.  Making war may force it but when we follow that route, how really different are we to Genghis Khan, Hitler or Osama bin Laden, who in their heart of hearts thought they were right too, but failed to see in their oh so myopic vision of the future that they were neglecting to understand a better view?

And, one last thing.  If we Americans just have to have killing like abortion, capital punishment and war, to settle our differences with others or to solve some "problem", I would say we are not the "home of the brave".  The brave would get into the boxing ring like Maximillian Schmell and Joe Louis did or as Ali and Frazier did, and let the best man win.  I would personally buy the boxing shorts for both Bush and Osama if they would do us the favor.  Personally, I think Saddam in shorts looks like a candidate for the ring and Id like to see him duking it out with whomever the Shiites and Kurds would like to put in the ring with him.  When we televised that battle, the insurgents, I think, will go home. 

However, since none of the above is probably man enough to settle their differences in a manly way, I have another suggestion.  Since we Americans think killing is so wonderful, I think it should be mandatory that all abortions and executions be televised with as many cameras, close ups, repeat shots and slow motion as a football game has, so we can all see "justice" be done.  Why hide it, if it is the "right" thing to do?  And, I think it should be illegal to force anyone to kill anyone except by those who seem to love it, those criminals who are worse than the criminals they want executed, like representatives of the people, that vote for torture or capital punishment.  They should have a choice: (1) they could have the same thing done to them first, so they can see what it is like, in case theyd like to change their vote; or, in the alternative, (2) they should be there when the torture and death takes place, so that we, watching our television sets can see who the murderers are.  I am sure, since it is such a "right" thing to do, they will be glad to witness the event and be glad for Americans to know who are the murderers and who are not.  And, lastly, since law and order people are so law and orderly, I would say that the executive branch of government should be the sole party to execute our laws on our citizens.  That is, it is not right for correctional officials to do it, let President Bush personally do it.  After all, he is the chief executive.  Since he loves capital punishment so much, he should be the Chief Executor.  He does what the Constitution demands when nominating members to the federal bench, no?  Why not "execute" those who have no jobs, too?  It is his job.  For those boys and girls who do not want to serve in his dirty little war and thus desert, go AWOL or otherwise disappear or fail to shoot people, I would have Bush on national television, executing them all personally himself (like the famous photo of a South Vietnamese general shooting into the head of a Viet Cong suspect on a Saigon street), so the world can see what a wonderful law and order country we are, where Bush nor Americans are ashamed of what they do.

While we are at it, lets put big blow up photos of all the innocent people we know about who were not guilty who were tortured or killed in the background in the execution chamber, to remind us all of how many times we have made a silly "mistake" by killing the innocent.  Lets see, that would be those many blacks executed or lynched when DNA proved they could not have committed the crime, long after their torture or deaths, and it would include Thomas More, Dreyfus, Galileo, Joan of Arc, Socrates, disciples Peter and Paul and Jesus.  Since we have such a mania for killing in this country, lets also put up on the walls photos of the fetuses, or whatever is left of them, after we have poisoned or gassed them and scraped them out of their mothers wombs.  After all, if it is the "right" thing to do, what are we so squeamish about?  The Inquisition that burned so many at the stake werent.  Those men of authority like the Pharisees and Catholics were just as righteous as those Middle American Christians of today that just love killing anyone that disagrees with them, be they Jews, Catholics or those "Nigras" (today it might be "illegal aliens", what we used to call, "immigrants").

Yes, if America would probably hold up and advertise its present righteousness to the world and show the world how wonderful we are to kill any and all those that "terrorize" us, those infidels that dont even share our religion like the Buddhist Japs of World War II or the Moslem jihadists that insurgently resist our poor, "brave" occupation troops, the world could see it for themselves!  I would have television cameras at Abu Ghraib and Gitmo so we can all see for ourselves how humanely we interrogate the captives.  After all, if we didnt do it, they and their friends would be doing to us, no?  Someone must avenge those 3000 in New York and Washington, DC, since the murderers were all blown up in the planes, so the world knows that as peace loving "Christians" or secularist humanists, we never forgive anyone that had anything to do with those Muslim boys.  The American First Amendment right to be free from guilt by association, is certainly silly, isnt it?  How in the world could we punish anyone and everyone if we let them "assemble peaceably"?.  And, dont you be reading those books now.  We know where you live.  We, of course, wont be honest about it and ban certain books like the Catholics and Blue Law Boards did.  We will just make you guess which books make you a suspect.  We should show the world how Christ taught us nothing about casting the first stone or that, after all, we are perfect, sinless, so we may.  And, we know it is best to torture people first, kill them second, and then give them a trial.  Like the church fathers who made eunuchs of those they claimed were heretics, stopping the progress of mankind for hundreds of years to assure the citizenry that they were on the job to torture, extract "confessions" and kill all who would dare challenge the Holy Mother Church or even her Protestant progeny, who likewise continued the horrendous nonsense up to and including in Salem, Massachusetts.  What are we so squeamish about, if it is the right thing to do?

No, on this Fourth of July, if no American can see that the Eight Amendment prohibition of no cruel or unusual punishment or the Fifth Commandment says "Thou shalt not kill" were designed to give some mercy to the captive and to protect us all from a government run amuck, or a mob of people out to "get us", then it might as well re-name "Gitmo" as "Getmo" since the insatiable desire of the bloodthirsty American is to "get more" and he or she shouldnt hide it.  It is the way of the flesh to make widows and orphans of others.  After all, those who are the influential in our society are already on the escape helicopter on top of the American Embassy in Saigon, so why cant the pilot lift off, and let the others die, now that we are safe as the most powerful country in the world?

Today is the Fourth of July, 2005.  Thank you, former Governor Ben Cayetano, for reading this essay in its draft form, although, as you said, after reading it twice, you couldnt understand it.  No one else read it or didnt understand it either.  I guess Americans have dummied themselves down to monkeys that see no evil, hear no evil and do no evil.  Sure.

My mentor, Robert Kennedy, once said, "We are in Vietnam, not because we can assassinate village leaders like the Viet Cong do, not because we have the power to coerce the people like the North Vietnamese do, not because we wish to impose a system on them that the people dont trust and dont want like the Communists do, but because we are different than that!"  Even though he won all the Democratic Primaries for President in 1968 except one (in Oregon to a fellow dove, Senator Eugene McCarthy), those that apparently disagreed with him killed him.  Watch out, Howard Dean.  The "majority" of Americans may "get cha" too.  When they cant find the Weapons of Mass Destruction or Osama, they may come after anyone who doesnt lockstep with them.  We may all be the next "heretics" and "infidels" who wouldnt pledge loyalty to King George III. 

It has been about 191 years since that tyrant who had weapons of greater mass destruction than anyone in the world knew, with a global navy and army second to none, who destroyed the White House in the War of 1812.  About 130 years after that "terrorism", FDR of America and Churchill of Great Britain forged the greatest alliance the world had ever seen against another tyrant, the axis powers, represented by Hitler, Tojo and Mussolini.  I know it must be hard for Americans to imagine that in 130 years from now, we would have strong alliances with the likes of Osama and Hussein, as we now have with the descendents of King George III.  Yet in just 5 or 10 years after that attack, we  respected the likes of Queen Victoria of Great Britain who became our standard for English sophistication.  Likewise, in 5 or 10 years West Germany, Japan and Italy were our allies again after World War II, as Afghanistan and Iraq are today, or at least becoming so, if we care about those Moslems as we cared about the Europeans under the Marshall Plan.  The civilized world may never forgive marauders like the Romans themselves who sacked libraries and schools in Alexandria, Egypt, in Rome or in Poland; we may never forget Valley Forge and the sacrifices we Americans have made to stop tyranny and implant democracy, but if Al-Qaeda were a nation, it would not be far fetched to suggest that like the nations of Germany, Japan and Italy, we would in short order consider it a friend.  Yes, we warred against those countries and brought them to their knees before we could begin the bonds of friendship again.  But on the Fourth of July, 2006 or the Fourth of July of 2011, we could be celebrating a new birth of freedom for even Moslem reformers who stagger forward with a new concept well suited to their great Islamic tradition, a democracy in nation states where warlords are overcome by a stronger force of national will.

In that sense I agree with President Bush that we must lead the United Nations for the goodthe good, for all the worlds people, as a parent must sometimes discipline the child.  If war is necessary when we are attacked and we can craft and forge a new world order thereafter, as in Yalta and Potsdam, of more justice, self-determination and freedom for all, forcing parliamentary debate on issues of injustice, not allowing guns and bombs to be the determinators of same, then, yes, I would say our "shot that was heard around the world" in Lexington and Concord and when those dignitaries at the Second Continental Congress on July 4, 1776 affixed their signatures to that Declaration, pledging their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor for the betterment of mankind, was a clarion call for all humanity to unite under a banner of individual liberty tempered with a consciousness that liberty must stop when it imposes on another persons liberty and probably only a strong government can ensure such an ideal.  If we as Americans will pledge our fortunes and honor and not just our lives for a cause that is right for all mankind, then we too could leave a legacy as the Romans did with Latin a living language of knowledge and strength for 2000 years.  So far English has been around for only 500 and the Romans too had their Caligula, Nero, Commodus and a Holy Roman Empire that darkened the world.  Still the languages of great knowledge, Greek and then Latin, transformed the world into the ultimate enlightenment as Hebrew and Aramaic brought morality to ancient man, despite despots and greed-mongers and the holier than thou crowd of Catholic Inquisitioners and fundamentalists, both Christian and Moslem and Jew, who cannot conceive of a world that does not hoist their banner above all others.  If the Hindus, Confucionists and Buddhists have taught us anything, it is that neutralism may sometimes have to be attained while we sort out our the ideological imperatives.  When JFK abandoned his generals views and took Bobbys advice to "quarantine" shipments of offensive weapons to Cuba, those "weapons of mass destruction" like nuclear tipped missiles aimed at Washington, DC, we now know that Castro and Khrushchev would have used them if we had invaded that tiny island.  Since Hussein and Osama had none, we had no problem taking the tiny countries of Afghanistan and Iraq.  And, I would venture to say that we could, Syria and Iran.  But, if a tiny country like North Korea is threatened, as in the perilous days of Pakistan and India flexing their nuclear muscles at each other, China and Russia could still come down on their side, if anything, to stop nuclear fall out from permeating Asia. 

Boycotts did work to a marvelous extent in the Montgomery bus boycott, ultimately led by Martin Luther King and in the grape fields in California under Caesar Chavez.  When a boycott was tried against Cuba, it worked too.  The Russians went back to Moscow with their weapons of mass destruction, left with only ICBMs, not IRBMs in their arsenals of war.  Our oil boycott of Iraq brought that nation to its knees as well, something I think George Bush senior accomplished, better than his junior.  But some boycotts such as our oil and rubber boycott against Japan in the 1930s when they were raping Manchuria and China, brought the Japanese to our doorstep with aircraft and torpedo technology better than ours.  The Versailles Treaty of a colonial class punishing Germany for World War I with high "rents" likewise, when Depression crippled Europe, brought a leader to Germany who got the Germans out of the Depression in just one month, unlike in the capitalistic democracies such as FDRs the "New Deal" that took 10 years.  Ironically, Stalins USSR was more stable than them all with a centralized economy, not dependent on the banks of London and New York.  By contrast, in the capitalist system a war economy fueled by a government in need of armaments was the main ingredient in the success of putting people in democratic countries back to work.  The Depression and a strong leader stirred the German people to new heights in weapons of mass destruction like excellent submarines, tanks, airplanes, V-2s and even jet engines by the end of the war.  And, they were practical people too, making the rear air-cooled engined Volkswagen the car for the working man and woman.  Not since Thomas Edison, Alexander Graham Bell and Henry Ford had a nation equipped its people so splendidly.  The technology of the aviator geniuses like Howard Hughes to make us preeminent in the stratosphere is telling, in that only Germans could get us into space by as late as the late 1950s.  Did fascism have its good points, then, you might ask?  Yes, as so it is the same now in the theocratic fascism of Iran and Al-Qaeda, and in the atheist fascism of North Korea. 

My point, though, is that boycotts have worked.  True, dictators like Hussein, Khomeini and Kim let their people suffer as we try to strangle their economies, but others like Castro have given his people the lowest infant mortality rate and highest educational rate than all other Latin American countries.  And, we too have had our own fascist friends in Batista, Somoza, Pinochet, Diem and Marcos.  Saddam and Noriega were also our friends when they were on our side, as was Osama when he was fighting the Soviet Bear.  We have tried to socially engineer democracy with economic taxation domestically and CIA interference with nationalist movements abroad for many a year, particularly since FDRs administration, and, to some extent, it works.  But if profit is the underlying goal, not democracy and self-determination, then the war profiteers have too much power, as Ike warned us about when he left office.

On this Fourth of July, let us reflect on these events of history and the principles that have made our nation so great.  When our President takes the oath of office at his inaugural, he pledges to "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States of America".  He has no duty of loyalty to the world, nor even the American people.  He is not duty bound to keep us "safe" or "defended" except in the sense that the Constitution has given him complete power of our military forces, checked only by the power of the purse which remains in the hands of Congress.  Only Congress can declare war under our Constitution, so why has it failed to do so, since World War II?  Our truly American concept of giving the judiciary a co-equal place in the American scheme amazes the world since it is truly independent of the executive and legislative branches, declaring laws of Congress unconstitutional and even bringing down a President, if need be, as in US v Nixon.(on "Executive Privilege" to keep the Watergate Tapes hidden from us). 

If we truly wish to celebrate this day as Americans should, we should know that the Constitution forbids imprisonment without the aid of counsel, without a jury trial, without habeas corpus, without due process, or with cruel or unusual punishment on the accused.  In times of war and against our enemies, these protections can be suspended, but in times of peace, they must be observed and even honored.  If we had had a perpetual "war on fascism" instead of finishing that war against Germany, Japan and Italy, would Nazi and militarist war criminals still be in jail, "interrogated" without any recourse?  Did you know that some of the Nazis were acquitted, some were imprisoned and some were executed?  Even Eichmann with forged Vatican papers claiming he was a priest, who escaped to Argentina through a Nazi "missing " submarine in 1945, was captured, spirited to Israel, and stood trial, before the Israelis ultimately executed him.  He had the right to defend himself, as I hope Saddam Hussein does, as I hope Washington, Jefferson, Adams and Franklin would have had, if the Tories had beaten us in our War of Independence.

Because civilized people are not lynchers who react to mob rule although certain people like Mussolini probably deserved their fate.  We can show the world, not with show trials and kangaroo courts that we will listen to the Defense, as we did for Michael Jackson, and if the "glove doesnt fit", we must acquit.  Not that OJ was innocent.  I think he was guiltier than sin.  But a civil court took his wealth; the criminal court chose not take his liberty or life. 

We have been taking the wealth away from tyrants since Prescott Bush, our Presidents grandfather, froze Hitlers American assets in New York.  That is one way to strike them as our boycotts have.  We can use "retorsion", a perfectly legal, non-violent means, to get to the end, instead of "retaliation", a reactionary method of violence.  We can have "restitution" and "restoration", instead of "recrimination" and "revenge".  But I know we are an impatient people like a spoiled child who throws a tantrum when we dont get our way, and immediately.  We dont want to wait a hundred years for something we could have in five years or five minutes.  After all, the 25 hours or so of debate between US Senatorial candidates Stephen Douglas and Abraham Lincoln in 1858 or the almost universal reading of Thomas Paines Common Sense in 1976 or The Federalist Papers in the 1790s when we werent all that much a literate nation, was in an era when Americans really did care about the Fourth of July, as Lincoln referred to as "fourscore and seven years ago" in his Gettysburg Address of 1864.  Without the aid of microphones or speakers, people came from everywhere in Illinois in 1858 to hear the debaters debate on slavery and whether the Union would remain united. 

Now, I see an America polarized like then but no real interest in debate.  Wed rather have sound bites that massage our biased views.  An ideological America is threatened on the right and the left by demogogs who tell an unsuspecting public what to think as Hitler or Stalin did, despite our inherent power to vote out or impeach a tyrant.  John Wilkes Booth and his friends thought Lincoln to be a tyrant and I guess the CIA and FBI rather thought the same about the Kennedy brothers, and Malcolm and Martin, but I would use the ballot, not the bullet, to settle our differences since that is the American way, not the McVeigh or Osama way.

Since President Bush won, fair and square, at least this last time, I think we should support him unless he commits impeachable offenses.  After all, in 2008 Al Gore, Howard Dean and Hillary will have another chance.  Maybe Obama or Newt Gingrich will give it a try.  Although Californians went for a Republican, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and we Hawaiians put in a Jewish Republican woman, Linda Lingle, I rather like Jesse Ventura, but in Hawaii, we are no longer allowed to write our nominee in on the ballot, despite a new hope for a two party state, making us a democracy here too, someday.  As we let big, organized ideologues and multinationals or we-bees tell us who "qualifies" for the ballot and who does not, and who we should choose only among those designated, taking away our inherent right to throw away our vote in protest for "Mickey Mouse", if we choose that we are not voting for "any of the above", we are like the Communists in the USSR who might have put up a Tweedle Dee and a Tweedle Dum as long as they were both approved by the Politburo, the KGB and their own military-industrial complex.  Other candidates contending could never garner the million dollars it takes to advertise and thus win.  Like those hapless Saudis and Iranians whose governments may find fault in women driving cars, or being in public without proper attire or accompanied by men, we live in a society that still yearns to break free from the Dark Ages of superstition and treachery, a Madison Avenue that can sell cigarettes,